#ritahester

[rebel-girl-queen-of-my-world]

This #TransgenderDayOfRemembrance is like to highlight the story of #RitaHester, a black trans woman of Boston who was murdered in Allston in November 28, 1998, just before her 35th birthday. The #internationaltransgenderdayofrememberance was started in her memory. She was described as bubbly, kind, and beautifully statuesque, and was I afraid of standing up for her friends. Too many of our trans and gender-nonconforming siblings are targeted for violence still. It’s an epidemic stoked by hate and ignorance, and if you are an ally you must be vocal. If you are a member of the LGBTQ+ community, we must never forget that trans women of color were the ones that paved the way for the greater freedom we have today to be who we are. To learn more about Rita Hester, look up Quincy Walters’ beautiful piece “Remembering Rita: The 20th Transgender Day Of Remembrance Is Painfully Personal For Boston” on the @wbur website. #transdayofremembrance #protecttranspoc #transwoc #lgbtqia #lgbtqcommunity #lgbtq #lgbtqboston #boston #allston #inmemoriam https://www.instagram.com/p/B5F3f2SgyQE/?igshid=38875makfxgs

[rebel-girl-queen-of-my-world]

This #TransgenderDayOfRemembrance is like to highlight the story of #RitaHester, a black trans woman of Boston who was murdered in Allston in November 28, 1998, just before her 35th birthday. The #internationaltransgenderdayofrememberance was started in her memory. She was described as bubbly, kind, and beautifully statuesque, and was I afraid of standing up for her friends. Too many of our trans and gender-nonconforming siblings are targeted for violence still. It’s an epidemic stoked by hate and ignorance, and if you are an ally you must be vocal. If you are a member of the LGBTQ+ community, we must never forget that trans women of color were the ones that paved the way for the greater freedom we have today to be who we are. To learn more about Rita Hester, look up Quincy Walters’ beautiful piece “Remembering Rita: The 20th Transgender Day Of Remembrance Is Painfully Personal For Boston” on the @wbur website. #transdayofremembrance #protecttranspoc #transwoc #lgbtqia #lgbtqcommunity #lgbtq #lgbtqboston #boston #allston #inmemoriam https://www.instagram.com/p/B5F3f2SgyQE/?igshid=38875makfxgs

[lgbt-history-archive]

Rita Hester (November 30, 1963 – November 28, 1998), c. 1995. Photo c/o DailyBeast. [TW] Rita Hester, who died eighteen years ago today, was a “renowned and infamous” trans activist in Boston, according to Reverend Irene Monroe. In 1997, after the brutal murder of another trans woman of color in Boston, Chanelle Picket, as her murderer, William Palmer, used the “trans panic” defense at trial, Hester told a local gay paper that she was “afraid of what will happen if he gets off lightly. It’ll just give people a message that it’s okay to do this.” Palmer received the lightest possible sentence: two years for assault and battery. On November 28, 1998, two days before her thirty-fifth birthday, Rita Hester was found in her apartment, stabbed twenty times in the chest; she was alive, though she died of cardiac arrest upon arrival at the hospital. Hester’s murder, reopened in 2006, remains unsolved. “What was different around Rita Hester,” trans advocate Nancy Nangeroni recalled, “was the reporting was egregious.” In the days following Hester’s death, as the national press continued respectfully to cover every detail of Matthew Shepard’s recent murder, not even New England’s gay and lesbian press could be bothered to respect Rita Hester, instead referring to her as “he” and placing her first name in quotes. The mainstream press, to the extent they covered the murder, was far worse. Boston activists fought back and, slowly, style guidelines for reporting on trans issues began to change. Moreover, in the wake of Rita Hester’s death, Gwendolyn Ann Smith, a San Francisco computer programmer, decided that, “if the media was going to ignore or misrepresent these cases,” she would create an accurate chronicle herself. Smith first created The Remembering Our Dead project, and then decided there should be an annual day of remembrance for Hester and other trans individuals lost to violence. In November 1999, Smith organized the first Transgender Day of Remembrance, an event that now is marked annually on nearly every continent. Rita Hester would turn fifty three on November 30. #lgbthistory #HavePrideInHistory #RitaHester (at Boston, Massachusetts)

[revolutionrosen]

CN: Transmisogynoir Violent Deaths

November 30, 1963-November 28, 1998.

May Rita Hester rest in power.

[mysva-blog]

Content Notice: reference to various forms of anti-transgender violence. End of content notice.

Image description: A photograph of the Transgender Awareness Month desk display at Degroodt Library is shown. The base of the desk is where pamphlets and books are located. The top of the desk holds an audiobook (in the center) and two informational papers (on the sides). The windows above and besides the desk feature various signs related to transgender life. The only legible sign in the photo reads, “November is Transgender Awareness Month!” with the umbrella term transgender flag (blue, pink, white, pink, blue stripes) as the background. End of image description.

Caption: Happy Transgender Awareness Month! Accordingly, as coordinator of Me=You: Sexual Violence Awareness (MYSVA), I set up a display and decorated the Young Adult section at the Degroodt Library in Palm Bay, Florida, USA. If yall want info on transgender voting, immigration, incarceration, bullying, or intimate partner violence, or wanna read some books written by transgender individuals or with us as main characters, check it out! The display will be there all month. End of caption.

Credits: Our organization’s symbol was designed by Jessica Travis. The pamphlets were designed by MYSVA member Ash Rivera. The media list was compiled by MYSVA coordinator Tena Gordon. Most of the signs are from the Trans Student Educational Resources (TSER) at http://www.transstudent.org/. The article on Transgender Day of Remembrance (TDOR) is from the TDOR official website (https://tdor.info/). The “Voting while Trans” guide is from the National Center for Transgender Equality (http://www.transequality.org/). End of credits.

-Tena Gordon